adult use

The Battle Over Marijuana Legalization in Minnesota

February 2, 2019 by Staff Writer

Earlier this week I wrote about the launch of the campaign to legalize cannabis for adult use in Minnesota. Since Minnesota is one of about two dozen states that doesn’t allow citizens to bring issues to voters via ballot, activists must focus on the Minnesota state legislature.

Minnesota voters have developed a bit of a reputation for being unpredictable at times; Minnesota was the only state in the win column for Democratic Presidential candidate Walter Mondale in 1984 (to be fair, it was his home state) and they made Jesse Ventura their 38th governor in 1998.

Whether or not these quirks will translate into state legislators approving marijuana legalization remains to be seen. After all, supporting cannabis law reform is not exactly a “maverick” position to have anymore. This is all the more reason to believe activists in Minnesota have a great shot at bringing real reform to their state this year.

Working toward that end is the pro-legalization group Minnesotans for Responsible Marijuana Regulation (MRMR). Described on their website as “a broad coalition of Minnesota organizations and individuals supporting and advocating for the legalization and regulation of marijuana in Minnesota for adult recreational use”, MRMR boasts a support roster that includes the Mayor of Minneapolis.

And MRMR hopes to educate state legislators and their constituents about why legalization is the best path to take. “We started Minnesotans for Responsible Marijuana Regulation because we believe now is the time to have substantive, collaborative, inclusive conversations that help shape what marijuana legalization and policy look like in Minnesota,” Laura Monn Ginsburg, the MRMR Campaign Co-Manager, told The Marijuana Times. “To that end, we decided to launch the campaign with a Steering Committee made of a diverse group of individuals that can work toward thoughtful, thorough, and equitable ways marijuana could be legalized and regulated in Minnesota. We intend to take the conversation well beyond the Capitol, and head out throughout the state to engage and listen.”

Laura told us that although a lack of ballot access is a challenge, legalization has several things going for it. “There are a number of things that work greatly to our advantage here in Minnesota: we have legalized medicinal marijuana, we have the experience of other states to draw from, we have two marijuana legalization parties that reached the threshold for major political party status, and we have a Governor and many other elected officials who openly support legalization and did so when they were campaigning,” she said.

Laura told us that MRMR wants “marijuana legalization in Minnesota to promote economic opportunity and public safety in every community and to redress the disproportionate adverse impacts that marijuana prohibition has had on our residents and communities of color. That’s going to require tough work engaging with many stakeholder groups, but that’s precisely the work we established MRMR to do.”

So far, Laura told us that the feedback in the state has been overwhelmingly positive, even though there are still some who are not ready to engage in a discussion about legalization. Sadly, those people will be left behind, on the wrong side of an issue that’s time has clearly come.

If you live in Minnesota and support adult-use legalization, the time to make your voice heard has come as well.

The Battle Over Marijuana Legalization in Minnesota
Source: Marijuana Times

Will Minnesota Lawmakers Legalize Adult Use Marijuana?

January 30, 2019 by Staff Writer

The year 2019 will be a tough one to encapsulate when it ends. There is so much going on this year in the cannabis law reform movement that a short summary will be impossible come late December. More than a dozen states will be deciding on some form of marijuana legalization or decriminalization – not to mention all the activity expected on the federal level in the U.S.

One of the states expected to make headlines this year for marijuana policy changes is Minnesota. Lawmakers in the state have introduced adult use legalization legislation that would allow limited amounts of cannabis possession, purchases and home growing.

“Minnesota’s outdated prohibition policy has become more of a problem than a solution,” said Rep. Mike Freiberg (DFL-Golden Valley), one of the legislation’s sponsors in the House. “It is forcing marijuana into a shady underground market, which creates more potential harm for consumers and communities than marijuana itself. Regulating marijuana would make our state safer by removing the criminal element and empowering our state and local governments to start controlling production and sales.”

The legislation would also allow local control over marijuana retailers and processors, seed-to-sale tracking, criminal record expungement and money dedicated to help neighborhoods hit hardest by prohibition.

“It is time for Minnesota to recognize that, like alcohol prohibition in the 1920s, its prohibition of marijuana does not work,” said Jason Tarasek, Minnesota political director for the Marijuana Policy Project and co-founder of Minnesotans for Responsible Marijuana Regulation. “By legalizing marijuana and carefully regulating its sale, we can keep it out of the hands of teens without needlessly arresting responsible adult consumers. This would allow law enforcement to spend more time addressing serious crimes, while also creating a significant new revenue stream for our state.”

With the forces that support cannabis prohibition being spread thinner every year, it’s important to push marijuana law reform on as many fronts as possible. Whatever resources they can muster will either be split up to fight legalization in several states, or prohibition forces will focus on one or two big fights in the hope that they can somehow slow down the legalization juggernaut.

The next 2 years will be brutal for those who fight against legalization. The blows will come from every direction and they will not let up. The time is now to get involved in your state, whether it be in Minnesota or elsewhere.

Will Minnesota Lawmakers Legalize Adult Use Marijuana?
Source: Marijuana Times

A Look Back at One Year of Adult Use Marijuana Sales in California

January 12, 2019 by Staff Writer Leave a Comment

For obvious reasons, the cannabis industry in California gets a lot of coverage, both from the “cannabis media” and from more mainstream outlets. As many know, the consumer market in California is huge; by itself, California boasts one of the largest economies in the world. Comprising about 12% of the entire country’s population, California holds 10 million+ more people than live in Texas and its population is roughly the same as those of Florida and New York combined. In other words, it’s big and there are a lot of people there.

In November of 2016 – after 20 years of medical marijuana – voters in CA approved recreational marijuana legalization, with sales beginning in January of 2018. We covered much of the journey of the last year here at The Marijuana Times, from the good news to the most ridiculous. High taxes and restrictive regulations kept a lid on explosive growth, forcing many smaller competitors out of business before they really got started.

Some of the problems were anticipated by activists in the state. “[T]hese problems were foreseeable from the outset, from the time the legislature passed the Medical Marijuana Regulation and Safety Act (2015), the template on which the current regulations are based,” Dale Gieringer, Director of CA NORML, told The Marijuana Times.

“It was inevitable that CA’s culture of backyard ‘mom & pop’ growers would be unable to compete in a legalized market,” Dale said. “It’s not like the parsley, tomatoes, or grapes we buy in the store are produced by small-scale backyard farmers. Modern day agriculture is performed most economically by large agribusiness enterprises.”

This new reality means that the demand served by small growers before legalization will now be met for the most part by large-scale growers. “Sadly, there was no way that all of these legacy growers could be accommodated under legalization. (I say sadly, because many of them were friends and supporters during the 40-year struggle for legalization),” Dale told us.

And while focus is on the adult use industry, Dale also wants lawmakers to keep an eye on improving the newly regulated medical marijuana program in CA. “[I]t’s most important that access for medical patients be protected and expanded, especially since MMJ has proven to be an effective harm reduction substitute for prescription opiates. Existing taxes and regulations have made it harder for needy patients to get affordable access to the medicine they need.” Along these lines, CA NORML would like to see the state protect medical marijuana patient giveaways as well as create employment and prescription drug protections for medical patients in the state.

Overall, Dale thinks the bureau that oversees adult use cannabis in California is doing a good job, considering the restraints it operates under. “Under Lori Ajax’s leadership, the Bureau of Cannabis Control has been very responsive to industry and consumer concerns. We are especially happy that they have ruled that local governments can’t ban licensed deliveries to residents in their jurisdictions. The problem is that there is only so much BCC can do within the straightjacket of existing state laws. For example, there’s nothing BCC can do to spur local governments to license more dispensaries. Nor can they streamline the laws that have chopped up transportation, cultivation, distribution, testing, manufacturing, etc. into so many rigidly discrete categories.”

The potential of the cannabis market in California is massive. Hopefully they are laying the groundwork for an industry that serves consumers with the best products at the lowest prices – something that should be the goal no matter what the industry.

A Look Back at One Year of Adult Use Marijuana Sales in California
Source: Marijuana Times